


Can't Make An Omelette

by citron_ella



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Egg Cracking, Gen, Gender Identity, Misgendering, Pollution thinks they're hot shit, antichrist Adam, children armed with sticks, compromised horseperson, everyone remembers, nonbinary characters - Freeform, really they are not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-17 22:57:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19964617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/citron_ella/pseuds/citron_ella
Summary: Pollution re-forms in and returns to Tadfield, promptly gets captured by a gang of children and catylises some self-discovery, all entirely against their will.





	Can't Make An Omelette

The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and there was Something in the river. 

Brian was poking it with a stick. 

The Them had gathered on the canal bank, after Wensleydale had found something off-white and shining in the murk of silt and shopping bags. It bobbed slightly as Brian, ever persuadable, jabbed at it. 

"I bet it's a body," Pepper said. "Bet it's a hapless victim of a serial killer. One of the ‘less dead’. My mum says they end up dead all the time."

"How are they less dead if they're getting dead all the time?" Wensleydale asked, peering at the Something in the river. 

Adam was silent, staring into the water. There was a familiarity to all of this, the electric tingle of celestial power in the air. Dog growled.

"Being less dead means that less people care you're dead, stupid," Pepper said. "Like if Adam died, we'd all be dead sad, but-" 

The Something in the river sat up.

Being four nearly-twelve year olds, a collective, primal instinct in the Them decided this was clearly a zombie. There was a great deal of shrieking and leaping back all round, and Dog progressed to loud, anxious barking. 

Pepper picked up a rather large rock and flung it as hard as she could at the creature. 

" _ Ow _ ," the Something gurgled, mucky water streaming from its mouth and nose. It reached up to touch the weeping wound the rock had left on its forehead, the gash oozing something reddish and very clearly Not Blood. "What was that for?" 

"Hang on a minute... no... wait," Brian stammered in recognition. "You can't be in our river. I  _ killed _ you." 

"I got better," replied Pollution, scraping mud out of their eyes. "You can't kill me in a way that matters.” 

The water around them – not very deep here, just about chest height –was shiny, filmed with oil. 

The Them looked to Adam, who asked, "Why've you come back to Tadfield?"

"Are you going to start another Apocalypse?" Pepper contributed. The look on her face said that there'd be no more Apocalypses round here, not on her watch, and the rocks which she picked up and held in each of her hands said she’d not quite got her head around proper weaponry yet. 

"It's easier to recorperate near where you got murdered," Pollution said. "I wasn't doing anything. Just taking a nap. It's quite tiring, getting  _ scattered across spacetime _ ." 

"My dad says," Wensleydale began, with the tone of someone repeating the word of God, "that frogs hibernate in mud, in the bottoms of rivers, because it gets too cold. Is that what you were doing?" 

"Hang on, were you drawing dark power from our river?" Adam asked. "Cosmic thingyos can do that sometimes." 

"So what if I was?" Pollution folded their arms, petulant. "There's no laws against it." 

"I could make one," Adam said, coldly. 

"Not right, that," muttered Brian. "Going about, going in people's rivers and drawing dark power from them. Getting them all mucky. It shouldn't be allowed." 

" _ I _ didn't get the river all mucky," Pollution smiled an oil-slick smile. "Your beautiful little town did. This is a collective human effort-" 

" _ Get out of there _ ." Adam commanded.His voice shook the foundations of the Earth, and was heard in the halls of Heaven and the depths of Hell. 

"Alright, no need to be dramatic." Pollution waded to the edge of the river, and, with what looked like great effort, hauled their body onto the embankment and went limp.

Brian gave them a supplementary poke with the stick. 

"We could capture her." Wensleydale suggested. "Like with the witches." 

"I am not a  _ her _ ," Pollution, dripped aggressively and raised a hand in preparation for the requisite air-quotes, "and you can't 'capture' me." 

Adam raised one sandaled foot and placed it firmly on their chest. 

"There," he said. "You're captured. Pep, could you get Georgia's wagon?"

Pepper nodded, and ran off. 

Adam rummaged through his pockets and found some twine, which he'd been keeping handy in case he needed it, tied the entity's wrists together and bound their arms to their body. According to the laws of physics, the string shouldn't have been able to do anything, but they only started teaching those at Key Stage 4.

"I could obliterate all of you," Pollution threatened. "I could fill your lungs with asbestos and your blood with mercury. I could make all the air around you into mustard gas."

"You know, I don't think you could," Adam said. "I reckon you'd have done it already." 

Pollution scowled up at him and stuck their tongue out. 

"Where are we going to hold him hostage then?" Brian asked, swinging his poking-stick upright.

" _ Not a him _ ." 

"Anathema's got a shed." Adam suggested. "She'd let us keep a hostage in her shed, I think. She's nice." 

"I'll ring her." Wensleydale said. 

Pepper rattled back with her sister's bright red wagon, and collectively the Them hefted the Horseman up and poured them into it. 

Pollution complied, but only because Cosmic Hierarchy dictated they do so. The Antichrist was, unfortunately, very important, which meant the Horsemen had to defer to their annoying baby cousin if such a situation arose. He was permanently and unfairly in God's metaphorical good books for being such a big part of the Plan. 

And besides, getting discorporated and being reborn was extremely tiring. Pollution had never done it before, and their body felt like cooked spaghetti.

Brian poked them with the stick again.

"Can I have a go of the stick?" Pepper asked. Pollution scowled as it changed hands, and braced for impact.

* * *

Anathema Device had long since adjusted to small town life in Tadfield. She missed her home sometimes, but she was now fairly comfortable with the close-knit chattiness, church events and constant intrusions by supernatural beings. As such, when she'd heard the Them were bringing one of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse round to be held hostage, she figured it was best to smooth things over and play hostess. 

She'd just put the kettle on when she heard them coming, four children huffing up the hill with the (very damp) avatar of ecological destruction in a comically small red wagon. Pepper was hitting the Horseman with a stick, swooshing the flexible end down like a whip to smack the top of their head repeatedly. They’d recorporated in a slightly different form; their hair was back in a stubby ponytail, and their biker gear had been swapped for slightly ratty dungarees. 

Anathema waved. 

Wensleydale jogged over looking alarmed. 

“What do you do with a hostage?” he asked, quietly, pushing his glasses up. 

“Hmm…” Anathema said. “Hold them for ransom, I suppose. I’ve got the shed set up.”

Wensleydale nodded soberly, then ran back to his friends. Adam asked him something, and he returned.  
  
“Adam says you’re not allowed to give the hostage biscuits,” he reported dutifully. “Except for the green ones. Mocca biscuits count as torture.” 

“They’re  _ matcha _ ,” Anathema clarified, a moment too late. Wensleydale was already running back.

Twenty minutes later, the children had set up their hostage in the shed, shielded from the dust by one of Anathema’s numerous handwoven rugs. There was a sigil woven into the pattern, designed for cleansing a space of evil energies. Anathema had grabbed it from a cupboard at random, but on reflection that may have been rather unethical. The entity squirmed as they were tipped onto it, like it itched. 

Pepper was still poking them with the stick. She was experiencing some new and confusing thoughts that she wasn’t really all that clear on, which was rather frightening for someone like her. Pollution was clearly very evil and bad and had tried to do an Apocalypse in  _ her _ town, but…

“You’re not a  _ boy _ , are you?” she asked, jabbing harder with the stick.

Pepper had sworn off boys, with the exception of the rest of the Them. Even boys who had cool motorbikes really cool eyes and pretty hair and could breathe underwater. Especially if they'd done things like hurting penguins and polar bears and sea turtles, and not even apologised. At least when Adam had been about to end the world, he'd seen sense and said sorry. 

“No!” the Horseman tried valiantly to bat the stick away with their bound hands. 

Pepper’s mum had put her in self-defense classes at the age of six, and then in Karate at seven as a healthy outlet for the anger that got her kicked out of self-defense classes. She knew where all the squishy bits were. 

Her onslaught was interrupted by Adam, bursting through the door with Dog in arms and Brian and Wensley trailing after him. She rather regretted that she'd have to leave. 

“We’ve agreed on your ransom,” Adam announced, using his best grown-up serious voice. 

“And I’ve brought biscuits,” Brian said, eating one in a storm of sticky crumbs, and then wrinkling his nose at the actual taste. “Anathema says they’re avocado-date-cocoa chew cookies.” 

“Oh, could I have one?” Pollution perked up at the description. “I love avocado.” 

“You can have one if you agree to our ransom,” Adam said. “Give us our river back. Make it be clean again. You’re omnipotent, you can do that.” 

Motes of dust caught in the dingy sunbeam from the shed’s single small window. Wensley stole one of the biscuits. 

“Where should I put the rubbish, then?” Pollution asked haughtily. “Plastic doesn’t just  _ disappear _ , you know. It’s got some staying power. I’m not like the others” 

Adam rolled his eyes. “Well, who  _ can  _ make it disappear then?” he said, sounding utterly unimpressed. “Bit daft that you can’t. Thought you’d have more power in your domain.” 

“Under normal circumstances I could,” Pollution said. “But  _ someone  _ had to go and discorporate me.” 

“We could just do that again, y’know,” Adam said matter-of-factly, scratching Dog’s head. 

  
“Death could help,” Pollution offered. “Good luck finding him though. Need some sort of higher power, probably.” 

And thus Brian was left guarding the hostage with the stick while the other Them went and summoned a demon. And hopefully an angel, if he hadn’t left his ancient mobile down the back of the sofa again. 

Brian sat cross-legged on the floor, heedless to how dusty his entire outfit was getting, the poking stick across his lap. He stared at Pollution. 

Pollution stared back. 

Brian got the feeling that the Horseman was trying to be scary. Ice-blue eyes like that should have been boring into him. But he’d seen this creature  _ die _ , at his hand, and gone home and convinced his mum to ring the council for a recycling bin. The incarnation itself wasn’t really frightening.

He tried to look very bored-into, though. It seemed like the kind thing to do. 

Then he offered the Horseman a biscuit. 

“You said…” he chose his words carefully, watching Pollution struggle to handle the oddly-sticky biscuit. “You said you’re not a boy, right?” 

A mumbled yes was accompanied by a spray of sticky crumbs. 

“And not a girl neither.” 

“Not a girl.” 

Brian considered this for a moment, frowning. 

“Is it ‘cos you're an apocalyptic entity?” he asked, his heart fluttering in his chest.

The aforementioned apocalyptic entity shrugged, making ineffectual grabby-hands for another biscuit. “Sometimes, it’s just how people are.”

There is a feeling unique to humans, to human children especially. It happens in response to little nods and familiar gestures, faces shaped or coloured like their own. It builds behind the breastbone and rises, like the sun, spreading a glowing warmth through the whole body. 

It is a response to seeing oneself reflected. Realising that, despite all evidence to the contrary, you are not entirely alone. 

“Oh,” Brian said, taking another biscuit. “Didn’t know that was…  _ allowed _ .” 

Outside, there was a dramatic burst of smoke and an even more dramatic flare of heavenly light, and when the auras of competing miracles had finally hashed it out and buried the hatchet, Crowley poked his head in. 

“Alright,” he said, nodding to the Horseman. Pollution did a  _ very _ rude hand gesture, prompting Crowley to do an even ruder one back, and the conflict escalated until Brian felt compelled to cover his eyes.  


* * *

Death was eventually summoned. 

The Them watched as a black smudge of a being rolled up the little garden path, like standing smoke. He had the good grace at least not to kill the flowers. And at least this time he hadn't brought the scythe. 

Crowley stared him down, nominally unafraid, but Aziraphale stepped forward and did a little wave, completely destroying his image.Took a lot of guts, that. Being all buddy-buddy with the Angel of Death. 

Death afforded Aziraphale a nod of recognition, and proceeded to Adam. 

I UNDERSTAND, He said. THAT I HAVE BEEN CALLED TO BARGAIN.

"Yeah," Adam said. "We want our river cleaned up." Then, in a rare show of respect, he added, "Please?" 

"Specify, kid," Crowley butted in. He knew angels very intimately, and they happened to have rather a lot in common with lawyers.

"The term 'the river' here is  _ inclusive _ ," Aziraphale clarified. "All the way back to the source." 

IF IT MUST BE.

* * *

When the deal had been struck – complete with an inexplicable bolt of lightning rending the sky as Adam's slightly dirty hand met Death's skeletal one – and the grownups had gone inside to have tea and be boring, the Them went back down to the river.

"Y'know," Brian said, tentatively. "Pollution…  _ they _ said that they've not got to be a boy or a girl or anything." 

"Makes sense," Adam said, squinting in the sunshine. The river was glittering blue on the horizon, shining like glass. "I've only got to be an Antichrist, and I've not even really done that." 

"You're a boy Antichrist, though?" Wensleydale said, kicking a rock. 

"Who says?" 

"The Bible, I think. It's  _ son _ of Satan in the Bible," Pepper said. "I reckon, it's cos even back in Bible times they knew only a man would do something as pointlessly destructive and paternalistic as the Apocalypse. No offense, Adam." 

None was taken. 

"So they could just...  _ not  _ be anything?" Brian continued. 

Wensleydale shook his head. 

"You've got to be  _ something _ ," he said. "Even if it's just a brand new thing you've invented, otherwise how'd you know where to go when you do dancing at school?" 

They reached the riverbank. The water was so clear as to be nearly invisible. 

"Uh, I don't think the Horsemen of the Apocalypse  _ went  _ to school," Pepper said, like that was the stupidest idea she'd ever heard of. "And besides, nobody's got to be anything. My mum's got a book about it." 

She stopped to trail her fingers through the crystal clear water. Small silver fish swam between them, a section of a population that would have taken years to establish. It was jarring to see the river like this, without even a single drowned shopping trolley or plank of wood in it, but she rather liked it. 

Her eyes were on Brian the whole time. Being that she was eleven, it wasn't very subtle.

"You can read it, if you'd like?" 

**Author's Note:**

> follow me for fic updates and headcanons [here!](https://citron-ella.tumblr.com/)


End file.
